Top 10 Forgotten Third Person Shooters

Gamers tend not to talk much about these titles—and we can’t figure out why. Welcome to WatchMojo.com and today we’ll be counting down our picks for the top 10 forgotten third-person shooters.

For this list, we ranked the most under-appreciated third-person shooters that either didn’t sell well on their initial release, or have since been forgotten over time. We’re sticking to one game per franchise, and we’re also ruling out Open World Sandbox Games, since those titles would be for a genre of their own.

Expert racing game developers Bizarre Creations mixed elements of their driving titles with violent mayhem, and the results were interesting. This club, where most of the game’s action takes place, is a brutal underground gladiatorial sport where tough guys go head to head while wealthy businessman place bets on who will survive. Features from racing games like time attacks events are flawlessly integrated into the shooter framework, and the combo system makes blowing your enemies away addictive as hell.

Why shoot when you can mess people up with the power of your mind . You play as Nick Scryer, an agent with telekinetic powers (5:25) who has his brain wiped by the government so that he can infiltrate a mysterious organization known as “The Movement.” Besides typical weapons, he can use his telekinesis abilities throw around his enemies or pyrokinesis to burn or blow them up. Best of all, the game’s ragdoll physics make every explosion look incredible. Think Mass Effect’s Biotics, but long before that game was ever showed up.

What do you get when you team up Resident Evil’s Shinji Mikami with Killer7 and No More Heroes’s Suda 51? Well you get this absurd action-packed tale of demon hunter Garcia Hotspur who has to save his girlfriend from terrifying supernatural enemies, with the help of a crude jokes telling floating skull. Said floating skull, named Johnson spends most of the game as a torch but he can transform into a pistol when he calls himself “The Boner,” which fires quote “Sticky Payload”. He also later gets an appropriately named upgrade.

This fantasy title was the sequel to an FPS, and it showed that the concept worked equally well through the third-person perspective. Like its predecessor, it tells the story of the Elven hunter Corvus, but this time he has to find the cure to a mysterious plague that turns his brethren into vicious killers. It’s quite an entertaining journey, because the expansive levels are a blast to explore. Instead of pistols and shotguns, Corvus uses a variety of magic and melee weapons to dispatch of his foes, a rather unique feature for a game of it’s time.

Thought nobody really mentions this franchise today, this genre is certainly alive a well and you can see the influences of this gorefest everywhere. The Suffering tells the story of Torque, a convicted killer who ends up having to deal with enemies far more threatening the law. While the gameplay is still your standard third person shooter affairs, the added tension from the horror setting and terrifying monsters clearly laid the groundwork other similar titles to follow.

Known as Operation Winback in Europe, Many gamers hoped that this stealth shooter would be the N64’s answer to the “Metal Gear Solid” games. It ended up not catching on like that franchise, but it’s still worth playing. The game uses a interesting cover based mechanic that allows special operative Jean-Luc Cougar to stick close to walls and perform quick pop outs from cover to shoot enemeies, waaay before Gears of War ever graced the scene. The game later ported to the Playstation 2 with improved textures, and voice acting that … well judge for yourself.

So what happens when you take the Pre-rendered background engine of the first 3 Resident Evil games and make a shooter out of it where you can actually move and shoot? One that ditched the puzzles from the first game and gave us all-out dino slaughter? Well I guess you’re looking at the answer. This is a game that really makes you realize that there’s a major lack of good dinosaur games out there. The more fossils you kill, the more Extinction Points you get, allowing you to acquire new weapon. Honestly It baffling that Capcom killed this franchise, I mean its not like it was something absurd like Dinosaurs in Space that … oh!

In the late 90’s Rare was to the N64 what Naughty Dog was to the PS3. And yet this game didn’t quite catch on as well the company’s FPS counterparts. Despite the less than intuitive targeting scheme, the title was way ahead of its time thanks to its varied gameplay, console defying visuals and an synthetic orchestral soundtrack. Helping the three members of the eponymous team defeat the evil insect Mizar makes for a good time, especially seeing as one of them is a Dog with a Jetpack, need I say more?

Another Shinji Mikami game on this list, and just like Shadows of the Dammed, it hasn’t had the staying power of his Resident Evil franchise, which is a shame cause it’s quite a fun title. It can be difficult to master, but part of its charm comes from the incredibly fun ARS suit, which allows you to do cool things with its jetpacks that allow you to skid at high speeds across the floor or make massive jumps in the air. Awesome animation and super fast gameplay made for a good package, but it seems that nobody ever played it.


Before we get to our number one, let’s take a look at some honorable mentions:

“Earth Defense Force 2017” (2007)

“50 Cent: Blood on the Sand” (2009)

“Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine” (2011)

“Syphon Filter” (1999)

As unforgettable as the original “Star Wars” movies are, gamers lose track of some of the games, like this one. Shadows was part of a multimedia project which also included a Novel and Comic of the same name, which tells a story of Dash “Totally Not Han Solo” Rendar, a smuggler hired by the rebellion that gets caught up in their war with the Empire. Noteworthy moments include an amazing recreation of the Battle of Hoth from Empire Strikes Back, and intense 3rd person combat where you can later use a Jetpack, and pretty much all with the iconic Star Wars locations, characters and weapons we know and love. Except light sabers.

Chances are given that nature of this topic, that it’s likely we’ve forgotten a few hidden gems. So let us know about what third-person shooter you wish more people talked about, and For more memorable top 10s published daily, be sure to subscribe to WatchMojo.com.